O Little Town of Newtown

Dr. Barry Corey
Share:

O little town of Newtown, how still and sad we see thee lie. 

Newtown. About 100 miles from the little town where I grew up. That Connecticut bedroom village where local industries long manufactured fire hoses and folding boxes. The town where the game Scrabble began. The bucolic community where pizza places have names like Carminuccio’s and elementary schools names like Sandy Hook. The New England hamlet where streets describe its pastoral landscape: Head of Meadows and Boggs Hill and Deep Brook.

Newtown, the little town where streets became dark a year ago.

Along with countless others around the world, I found incomprehensible the merciless slaughtering of 12 little girls, 8 little boys and 6 caring educators, all women. And at Christmastime? Why, for heaven’s sake? I keep asking this question, hardly alone.

As I ask, I recall a halting line from the Christmas carol “O Little Town of Bethlehem.” Tucked in those verses is a phrase recalling the pain inseparable from life, darkness coexisting with light: “Yet in the dark streets shineth/The everlasting Light/The hopes and fears of all the years/Are met in thee tonight.”

Darkness and fear mingling with hope and light. 

The streets went dark in the southwest corner of Connecticut last Christmas. And they were just as dark in Bethlehem after Jesus was born. Matthew’s Gospel talks about it in chapter 2:

“When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi” (v. 16, NIV).

Our temptation is to fast-forward past this graphic tale of Herod’s cold-hearted soldiers knocking down doors in the middle of the night and dragging toddlers out of their beds while parents were restrained. I don’t even want to imagine what happened next. Think about it too much and it’s stomach-turning.

Part of me wishes someone had plucked these verses from the Bible. Why did Matthew have to include this grave, chilling, macabre incident in the story of Christmas?

But there it is, right in the Bible. Not by mistake. Not because Matthew was trying to get all PG-13 on us. On the same streets where Jesus was born also lived families who’d soon lose their innocent little boys at the hand of the desperate despot Herod.

The hopes of a new mother, Mary, juxtaposed against the fears of mothers hiding their children as soldiers pounded on the doors of their homes. Inconceivable.

In The Brothers Karamazov, Ivan, an intellectual agnostic, poses a hard question to his spiritually sensitive brother, Alyosha: “But what about the children? How will we ever account for their sufferings?”

He goes on to say that he gets why many adults suffer. They make bad choices. It’s a matter of justice for them to suffer. But the children, he goes on, “Their tears must be atoned for. … How is it possible to atone for them?”

It’s an unavoidable question in a world where massacres like Newtown can happen. How will we ever account for the suffering of children? Pain at times seems random and unfair, forcing us to shake our heads in unbelief or turn our heads in horror.

I suppose the mothers of Bethlehem had questions to ask when they realized that the birth of a Savior cost them the lives of their little boys. I suppose if they knew that Joseph had been warned by God in a dream to flee Bethlehem and dodge the sword of Herod, they would have asked, “Why didn’t God send us a dream too?”

When we try to answer this question, more questions surface. 

Even Dostoyevsky admitted that when he wrote his dialogue between Ivan and Alyosha, he wasn’t sure he would be able to answer Ivan’s questions either.

Why did Jesus get away, protected by the angels and rescued through a dream?

Jesus got away so that He could later atone for the blood of those children and their mothers’ tears. Christ came amidst the pain of life in order to redeem the pain of life.

As wicked, evil, unfair, random and deep as the pain may be, even in this country today, in Christ we have hope that the pain will one day be removed. We have hope in life because we have hope in Christ’s death. N.T. Wright says that Jesus went “solo and unaided into the whirlpool [of evil] so that it may exhaust its force on him and let the rest of the world go free.”

Dostoyevsky was able to answer the skepticism of Ivan through the words of a godly monk named Zossima, comforting a grieving mother: “Don’t you know how bold these little ones are before the throne of the Lord? … Weep, but every time you do, remember that your little son is … looking down on you from where he is now, that he sees and rejoices in your tears and shows them to God. … You will shed a mother’s tears for a long time to come. But in the end your weeping will turn into quiet joy.”

When we sing about Bethlehem, we cannot overlook the phrase that says “hopes and fears” come together on its dark streets. In the eternal framework of God’s sovereignty, in the dark streets of pain and injustice shineth an everlasting Light. 

The hopes and fears of all the years meet in Christ Jesus, Emmanuel, God with us. This is the hope we have. This is the promise we must remember, especially for those this Christmas whose ledger is more on the side of fear than hope, darkness than light.

The first-century mothers and fathers of Jerusalem whose children were victims of Herod’s egomaniacal jealousy knew darkness and fear. And last year’s mothers and fathers of Newtown mourned greatly and wept bitterly because 20 of their children were mercilessly killed, children with names like Emilie and Dylan and Caroline and James and Jack and Grace.  And like the town of Bethlehem, caskets far too small were carried to Newtown’s burial grounds. 

In all the twists of the Christmas story and for all its crushing contrasts between life and death, joy and pain, fear and hope, Christmas is and ever shall be a reminder that on dark and fear-filled streets, an everlasting Light will shine.

Everlasting. Imagine that.

Barry Corey is president of Biola University. Follow him on Twitter at @PresidentCorey or visit him online at www.biola.edu. 

+ posts
Share:

Related topics:

See an error in this article?

Send us a correction

To contact us or to submit an article

Click and play our featured shows

Why My Mother Is My Proverbs 31 Shero

For many years, especially on Mother’s Day, I have meditated on the virtuous woman from Scripture, found in the book of Proverbs, Chapter 31. I have admired many women who fit the pattern of the Proverbs 31 woman. My mother,...

Benny Hinn’s Public Apology: ‘I Am Sorry’

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2DyhGQcegQ Amid controversy as a recent four-hour-long video by Mike Winger has come out showcasing the past pitfalls of Benny Hinn’s ministry, Hinn has publicly come out to make his statement about his prior ministry mishaps. “I’m a human being....

How You Can Help Heal a Deeply Divided America

The young 25-year-old Methodist preacher and revivalist George Whitefield arrived in America in 1738 with a prayer on his heart that the inhabitants of this land would “No longer live as 13 divided Colonies but as One Nation under God.”...

This Mother’s Day, Celebrate the Power of a Praying Mom

American Heritage Girls, one of the world’s largest Christian scout-type organizations, is proud to offer biblically sound advice for girl moms as they raise their daughters after God’s own heart. Breaking news, Spirit-filled stories. Subscribe to Charisma on YouTube now! “Girls...

Top of the Week: Benny Hinn Breaks Silence Amid Controversy

https://youtu.be/CttP6Ll2o0w Following are snippets of the top stories posted over the past week on charismanews.com. We encourage you to visit the links to read the stories in full. Benny Hinn Breaks Silence Amid Controversy https://youtu.be/f2DyhGQcegQ Pastor. Preacher. Author. Charlatan. Evangelist Benny...

Jenny Weaver: Breaking the Curse of ‘I’m a Bad Mom’

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vVjoymPCJo0 As a mother herself, revivalist, worship leader and author Jenny Weaver wants all mothers to know they are not a “bad mom.” They are not a failure as a parent in the eyes of Jesus. In this interview with Charisma News’...

Benny Hinn: Should He Repent?

https://youtu.be/f2DyhGQcegQ Should Benny Hinn repent? It’s the question people have been asking for years. While Hinn has publicly apologized for the moments he says he got things wrong in ministry, there are still skeptics about his motives. In an exclusive...

Stop Eating Spiritual Junk Food

“You shall keep My statutes. You shall not let your livestock breed with another kind. You shall not sow your field with mixed seed. Nor shall a garment of mixed linen and wool come upon you” (Lev. 19:19, NKJV). For...

Top of the Week: Benny Hinn Breaks Silence Amid Controversy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CttP6Ll2o0w Following are snippets of the top stories posted over the past week on charismanews.com. We encourage you to visit the links to read the stories in full. Benny Hinn Breaks Silence Amid Controversy https://youtu.be/f2DyhGQcegQ Pastor. Preacher. Author. Charlatan. Evangelist...

The Mass Exodus To ‘Red-State America’

In recent years we have literally seen millions of Americans relocate from blue states to red states.  In some cases, there is simply a desire to be around other like-minded people. In other cases, specific political policies that have been enacted...

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 97 98 99 100
Scroll to Top